Monday, March 19, 2007

The temporary housing.

We arrived on Thursday afternoon and have been starting to settle in. I took some photos of the temporary housing and linked them below. We are staying at a seafront apartment with a hell of a view. Thursday night we went for a walk and got some fresh fruit from one of the trucks. Mid-March and the fruits are really good here. We are at the end of the rainy season so things will get more sparse as time goes on. With this being the rainy season the island is actually pretty green. Again, we are told this won't last. Tomatoes are in season and awesome.

Friday we went with one Realtor that showed us a bunch of houses that were a little far out. You talk to some people and they say there is no where on the island that is too far out. The next person will then say that same place is way too far. Just for the record those place are probably about 9-12 miles from the Embassy. The big deal is how long it take you to get in with traffic. All the houses were much bigger than our house in Philly. All of them had pool and small to large gardens. We are told as you get closer to the embassy the gardens and houses tend to get smaller.

The first Realtor, who took us out on Friday, is a South African who married a Maltese woman. Some of the things he said contradicted what was said by other people at the Embassy and people Lynne had met. Realtor number two took us out on Saturday. This one was a Maltese woman who was very chatty and loved to call everyone sweety or sweets. Saw three places with her. All were closer in. One is very close to the night life. Again a large house with 3 terraces. There was a garden downstairs, but not a lot of dirt for Kirby. He may have survive pooping on pavement for two years. The second two were on the same street in Attard, which is a little village. It is a little farther from the sea but I don't think that one would be too bad. The first one had an amazing garden with a pool. The house was an older home that was being refurbished. It was very nice and had plenty of room. Both Lynne and I thought that was our favorite so far. Right down the street was another one that had a small garden and pool. The owner was a doctor who like to collect antiques. It was lovely but a bit intimidating with all of the things that could break on you. The other odd things was that you had to go through one bedroom to get another bedroom and bath. The one cool thing is the house had an old bunker from the second world war with steps carved in the bedrock going down into it.

Sunday we took the bus into Valletta to check out how the bus worked. We wandered around Valletta for a couple of hours then took the ferry back home. The weather has been pretty nice so far - not too warm and pleasant during the day. The house and apartments are largely built with marble and limestone so they don't hold heat. They are quite cool. This will be very helpful in the summer when it is brutally hot but right now it means the house is actually colder than outside which is not making Lynne happy one bit.

1 comment:

Anonymous
said...

Everything looks beautiful. Keep sending pictures like this and you will have a house full of visitors in no time.

My co-worker (who went to Malta when he was in the Navy) has one piece of advice. Don't go to the Maltese Mental Hospital. And if you go, don't play or hum the Maltese National Anthem or our national anthem. They don't like it much.